Belated Promise Ring
by karebear
Summary: She couldn't even die properly, she reflects bitterly, as she watches everyone dying around her. Valentines Day gift exchange, for Eilonwycousland. Set in her "The Way It Is Now" universe.


For **Eilonwycousland** for Valentines Day, and because she asked, and because she's a friend. Writing other people's characters is impossible and I should never volunteer to do it again. But I hope she doesn't hate it anyway. Story title is from a song by Iron & Wine.

Prompt: A blight scene, perhaps something kind of sad, like a reflecting thing. Ely's heart belongs to Nate (well, it does in her childhood story and again in Awakenings. In Origins she doesn't really think about love so much except in a very bitter, angry way).

This takes place between chapters 5 & 6 of her story "The Way It Is Now" after the crew has arrived in Lothering after Ostagar, before picking up Leliana and Sten.

* * *

Ely steals away from her companions, tromping through what little remains of the scattered patches of forest around Lothering. It takes far longer than it should to escape the reach of their constant bickering and nagging. She walks until exhaustion overtakes her, physical and mental. She is tired, still, which she supposes can only be expected. She'd nearly died, after all. _Nearly_. Maker, she couldn't even _die_ properly.

A sudden furious rage overtakes her leaden apathy, and she picks up whatever's nearby: rocks, sticks, anything she can get her hands on. She throws them as hard as she can, as far as she can, and screams loud enough to frighten the nearby birds into scattering from the trees, a rush of dark wings.

The autumn chill seems to freeze her to the bone, she shivers much more than she should. The sticks she throws land in the mud that shifts and squelches around her feet, the rocks splash into puddles and the bed of a drought-dead creek. The world around her is grey, choked in heavy fog.

Ely sinks to the base of a skeletal tree, and huddles among the crumbling, dying leaves that little the muddy ground. Only days ago, perhaps, those leaves were shockingly bright, but now the oranges and reds have faded to sickly yellows and dull brown.

Her hair falls into her eyes as the wind blows. The limp and ragged strands obscure her vision, but she after two or three failed attempts to right the mess, she stops trying. More disturbing are the scents brought in on the wind: smoke and decay, old blood and the gutted corpses of the battlefields, of Ostagar and of her childhood home.

There are no more tears left in her, yet somehow still she attempts to cry. Her chest burns with the effort, and her breathing grows increasingly ragged.

She beats at the rough bark of the tree until her hands come away bloody. And then, she wrenches the ring from the chain round her neck, and throws it into the puddle. She cannot even _think _about Nathaniel Howe, without thinking of his father and the brutal slaughter of everyone and everything she'd ever known.

She'd thought she'd known what love was, but she was just a stupid girl. He'd _left _her. He'd done everything his lying, evil father ordered him to, and blamed her without even thinking, siding with the traitorous Arl of Amaranthine over her. Someone who loved her as much as Nathaniel Howe had promised he did wouldn't have believed her capable of such betrayal. He'd have believed in her.

_Tell me it isn't true_, his last letter had begged her. Bastard. As if it weren't _his_ family that had killed _hers_.

She watches the ripples slowly fade, the small bubbles rising to the surface of the surprisingly deep puddle of water where his engagement ring lies, waiting to be tromped on by whoever passes through this patch of wood of the Kingsroad next, because she sure as hell doesn't want it back.

She hears a rustle of something behind her, feels a tingle crawl up the back of her neck, a frighteningly intimate awareness of another presence, almost close enough to touch.

"Alistair," she breathes. She knows it's him. He'd tried to explain it to her, in his stumbling, uncertain ramblings. What it meant to be a Grey Warden. That they're connected now, by virtue of the fact that they'd both drunk out of a cup full of Darkspawn blood. She carries death inside her now. Of course she does.

"No offense, but I kinda came out here to be alone."

"As you wish, my lady."

"Shut it, you idiot!"

Alistair opens his mouth, then slams it shut again. He ducks his head. "'m sorry," he murmurs. "I didn't think."

Noble birth, or lack thereof, doesn't mean anything in the Wardens, a fact it's taken him years to get used to, and he still falls prey to old habits. Obviously. But the seriously pissed off woman in front of him now stands to inherit nothing but charred ruins. "I really am sorry," he repeats.

Eilonwy Cousland just looks up, meeting his eyes with a slightly confused expression. She nods dully. "You can stay if you want to," she tells him. "I just need…"

"To grieve," Alistair fills in. Of course she does.

She nods. The two of them sit there in awkward silence.

"I can't pretend to know what you're going through," Alistair finally says. His voice sends soft rumbles through Ely's body. "But I have… lost people."

Ely shrugs. She doesn't have enough in her to feel sorry for other people. "We should get going," she says aloud, instead. Every moment they linger in Lothering means more time she lets slip past without looking for Fergus, or hunting down Rendon Howe and claiming her family's vengeance.

Alistair nods, somehow making even that simple gesture look deferential. "As you wish," he says smoothly, and he follows her through the chilly woods back to the small village. The sun is already beginning to set, rapidly darkening an already grey and cloudy day. Ely is aware, of course, of the over-eager ex-templar following to close behind her, and she almost whirls around to snap at him. Instead, she does the opposite. Relaxes her breathing. Slows her pace. And lets him lead her into the Chantry, which is crowded with refugees seeking safety and succor. She fits right in, just a broken girl who's lost her family. She watches silently as priests and templars and simple commoners rush past her in haste. She's never been a warrior, but she knows the fortifications and traps the villagers struggle to build won't be enough, if the darkspawn horde returns. But it gives them something to do, something to occupy their hands, and their minds perhaps. Ely knows she cannot begrudge them that.

In a quiet corner, Eilonwy finds the mage she'd met in the ruins of Ostagar; another girl who should've died, and didn't. The mage's blonde hair falls into her eyes as she kneels, with head bowed. Her lips move every now and then, whispering soft words. She finishes her prayer, and settles back onto the hard wooden bench. Her eyes meet Ely's, and she frowns, confused obviously. Well, that makes sense. The crowd of desperate, lonely people gathering itself around her confuses Ely just as much. "Are you praying?" she asks.

Melina nods. Her youthful face is full of seriousness and determination.

A smile quirks onto Ely's lips. "I wouldn't think you'd want to," she admits.

"Why?" Melina asks softly. "Because I'm a mage?"

"Because… I dunno. Because I don't."

She does find it hard to reconcile a woman believing in a religion that claims her very existence is evil. But then, Eilonwy finds it hard to believe in much of anything right now, especially a Maker that would steal her family from her so brutally.

She finds herself a bit jealous of Melina, who will never have to see her parents bleed to death in front of her. She's aware, as she kneels beside the woman, that her fingers have clenched into a fist again, and she doesn't care enough to loosen them. Melina notices, apparently, because she squeezes Ely's shoulder in what must be meant to be a comforting gesture. Or a commiserating one.

Ely draws in a long, deep breath. She settles back onto her pew, and watches as the other girl kneels and bows her head. "What're you praying for?" she finally asks, after a long moment. Melina tucks a loose strand of hair behind her ear, and shrugs. "Guidance, I guess." Ely snorts softly, and Melina frowns. "Did I… say something wrong?" she asks nervously.

Ely shakes her head. "No, of course not," she insists. "I think I could probably use some guidance," she adds, more softly. More truthfully than she wants to admit.

Melina becomes conscious of the weight of the ring around her finger the moment she notices the absence of the one that used to rest on Ely's hand, still visible in the imprint left behind on her skin. "I left behind someone I love as well," the girl admits softly. "Sometimes things are not as simple as you imagine."

Ely closes her eyes in an attempt not to cry. She nods, and draws in a couple of ragged breaths. She doesn't want to admit that she is still faltering. That there is a part of her still that wants to love him.


End file.
